Biggles woke at
three in the afternoon and wondered if his bed was on fire. After a moment's
reflection he accepted it was, grabbed a box of cigars and jumped out the
window.
“Fire!” he
screamed and immediately a howitzer stationed beneath his Nissen hut opened
fired and destroyed the local water works. Biggles had fallen asleep with a box
of Havanas and set fire to his room, it was only a ferret-like instinct for
survival and the fact he always slept with an open window insured his continued
existence. It was the fifth Nissen hut he had burned down that month and
sleepily wondered if smoking really was unhealthy.
“Biggles!”
Group Captain Wilkinson stared down at Biggles lying in the sand. Biggles was
cradling a box of Cubans, his teddy bear and trying to get back to sleep.
“Report for briefing.”
“Not now
matron,” Biggles smiled as he fell asleep, “in the morning, and biscuits
please.”
“Biggles!”
Wilkinson kicked Biggles feet. “Report for briefing, or I’ll have you shot for
insubordination!”
“Not the whip
matron!” Biggles blurted out in his sleep. “Not the whip!”
Five minutes
later he staggered into briefing tent with a cup of tea, his teddy and dragging
a sleeping bag he had pilfered behind him. He collapsed at a desk and laid his
head on the bear. Ten seconds later a five-foot ruler crashed down next to his
face and he woke up with a jolt.
“So glad you
could join us Captain Biggles!” Group Captain Wilkinson yelled at him.
“Ginger!” he
yelped and rolled his eyes around, trying to get his bearings. “Jerry’s on your
tail!”
Biggles had been now awake for three days, after a
reconnaissance mission over the southern Zagros Mountains had gone terribly
awry and he had landed his Hawker GR-9 Jump Jet in the main Bazaar of Istanbul.
How he had flown off course by 1500 miles was a matter of some confusion, but
was probably due to his using his teddy bear instead of the navigation computer
for directions. After being chased by the Kamu Güvenliği Teşkilâtı, or the
Turkish Secret Police, through most of the streets in Istanbul, Biggles had
finally escaped into the largest brothel this side of the Cairo and suffered a
worse case of sleep deprivation than the secret police could have ever
achieved. Three days later, it had taken five burly Royal marines in the middle
of the night to drag him away from the intoxicating rhythms of a room filled
with Turkish belly dancers and Irish whiskey.
Group Captain Wilkinson resumed his position at the
front of the room.
“Thanks to Captain Biggles’ unfailing ability to
lose the recon photos of the Iranian base at Imam Ali, near Khoramabad in the
Zagros Mountains, we are forced to repeat the mission.” He pointed at a map
with a laser. “Now we know the Iranians are up to something, because Khoramabad
had the word ‘bad’ in it. Or at least this is what MI-7 has decided, and given
MI-7 is the propaganda division of military intelligence – their opinion may be
subject to interpretation. So we are forced to undertake the mission, yet
again. Any questions?”
Biggles sat up and stared about the room blearily.
It was at this point he realized he was the only person in the room beside
Group Captain Wilkinson. He frowned. This meant he was going to take the
mission. Then he smiled and wondered how long it would take to get back to
Istanbul.
“Any volunteers?” Group Captain Wilkinson stared
Biggles.
Biggles grinned, thought about the brothel he was
about to elope to and held up a flying glove. “When Blighty calls – I’ll be
there!”
Group Captain Wilkinson smiled back. “Good Captain
Biggles. Since, however, we are missing your GR-9 Jump Jet as the Turks have
impounded it, we will be parachuting you near the Khoramabad base and you will
perform the reconnaissance on foot.”
It was quarter of an hour before the M.P.s had
cornered Biggles attempting to commandeer a Vickers VC10 to fly to Istanbul,
and instead bundled him and his parachute onto a Lockheed C-130 Hercules. It
was a further two hours later before he was thrown into the black sky above
Iran with a Stasi spy camera hidden inside his teddy bear. He would have
parachuted earlier, but they had to release him from a death-like grip on the
Hercules airframe as he screamed about frequent flyer miles to Istanbul.
In the empty gloom of the freezing air above
Khoramabad, Biggles wondered about early retirement at the age of 110, but then
cheered himself up when he realized he had his bear to talk to.
“You know Monty,” he said to his habitual companion.
“This reminds me of that time Matron took us to the London zoo on the Tube.” At
that moment, a tremendous barrage of flak opened up around him, as Iranian
anti-aircraft gunners tried to shoot down the fleeing C-130 Hercules.
“Although, I can’t remember Matron being over Berlin with us.”
With this, he fell asleep as the toll of three days
without slumber finally caught up with him, all the while flak crumped about
him with all the danger of exploding sheep. In the morning he awoke wrapped in
his parachute and surrounded by a dozen Iranian soldiers armed with their
Khaybar assault rifles. They poked him with bayonets and sticks, and drowsily
he grumbled about Sleepy Time in the kindergarten.
“Get Up!” said a solider with more facial scars than
a cow at the wrong end of an abattoir.
“Whiskey. Ice.” Biggles mumbled as they dragged him
to his feet and through him in the back of a Cobra armoured personnel carrier.
“Have you cigars?” and then promptly fell back to sleep.
He awoke strapped to a chair and a bucket of water
in his face.
“Heathens!” He ejaculated, then blinked and saw
remarkably it was his latest archenemy Captain Arash of the Iranian Savama, or
secret police.
“We meet again, Captain Biggles,” he lit a cigarette
and offered it to Biggles. “We have to stop meeting like this.”
“Yes, let's have lunch at the Lyceum club, oh wait
you’re not a member.”
“Really
Biggles,” Captain Arash pursed his lips in a smile.
“That's Captain Biggles to you,” Biggles raised his
eyebrows, “and I demand my rights according to the Geneva Convention.”
“Remind me what those rights are?”
“You don't know?” Biggles blew a smoke ring, “Well
first of all, any serving officer of the Royal Air Force is entitled to a free
telephone call, tea and crumpet on silverware any time of night, holidays in
Majorca during the off season, free dental care, and most importantly a date
with Christine Keeler or Anna Chapman depending whom we're are at war with at
the time.”
“But Captain Biggles,” the secret policeman sighed,
“we’re not at war, you are here spying on us, that makes you a spy and not a
prisoner of war.”
“Tosh - if you can fly a Camel, you can fly
anything.”
“That doesn't really follow from what I said, but
you’re still a spy.”
“Prove it!” Biggles slammed the table with his fist.
“I demand proof!”
Captain Arash pulled the head off Biggles teddy bear
and pulled out the camera.
“Monty!” Biggles shrieked. “You murderer!”
“It's just a toy.”
“And a serving officer in the Royal Air Force! That
bear was the best autopilot I’ve ever known! This is a war crime!”
“We're still not at war, and it's still just a teddy
bear.”
“Prove it! Give me justice or give me liberty!”
Captain Arash pulled out the stuffing of the bear.
“Torture!”
“I always get the nutters,” Captain Arash rolled his
eyes.
They then attempted to torture Biggles with electric
shocks and telephone books to the head, but every time they put a blindfold
over his head he promptly fell asleep as three days without sleep in a Turkish
brothel makes you immune to pain. Three hours later Biggles was put on a train
to Turkey, and told not to spy on Iranian secret bases anymore. The bear they
gave ten years hard labor for entering the country without a passport.
Copyright reserved by Jim O’Brien ©
